Blog, Week of November 18
(Teachers please tell your parents about this blog series. It will encourage quality home reading.)
Reading is interacting with the printed page to make meaning. The interaction comes from the children’s own past experiences. Adult readers and co-readers need to help the children connect their own lives to the narrative. Ask key questions that inspire children to respond with eagerness. You, the adult, then becomes an avid listener, only asking for clarifications along the way. The child learns to become a storyteller himself/herself. That is success, real success. I often hear parents say, always with a smile on their faces, s/he never stops talking. Great!
(Children know when you are really listening, and they know when you are not.)
As you choose a story concentrate on the gist. Gist: the essence, the heart, the import, the significance. This is how expert readers function, they find the key meaning. That is your task with the children, that they get the key meaning. Don’t let your beginning reader get bogged down in the words or sounds. After they check out the sounds take them right back to the meaning.
Some Key Questions:
How do you think (main character) feels?
How would you feel? Why?
What would you do, have done, if this happened to you?
How could you have made a different ending if you stepped into this story?
Tell me how (a character in the story) is like you. Is not like you.
The more children live in language-rich environments, the better their chances of becoming successful users of language and fluent readers themselves. “Tell me a story” is one of the most deeply rooted human requests. Children become literate by experiencing reading.
The story highlighted today is Stellaluna by Janell Canon. It is available in paperback from Amazon for under $4.00 or at your loca
l library.
“This book is about Stellaluna, a baby bat who finds itself lost, hungry, alone, and accidentally in a nest full of baby birds. The little bat is accepted by the birds, but somehow never feels at home, especially after a good scolding from the mother bird about hanging upside down -- hilarious. The artwork is outstanding, the story is entertaining, and children and adults love this book. I have even picked it up and read it a time or two after the children went to bed. This is an award winning book, and for good reason. There are strong underlying messages in it about place, acceptance, home and family.” Review, Amazon
The Concept I chose for this story is: Different species live and help the world in different ways.
Activity 1: Ask the children what they think it would be like to be another species. Then tell them the following story.
Once upon a time there was a little boy who decided he wanted to be a horse. Being a horse he could run fast across the meadow. That was better than being a boy, he thought. So he told his mother that from now on, he would be a horse. She smiled. And so he began to be a horse. He walked on his hands and his feet, he whinnied instead of talking and he brought his things into the barn so he could sleep there with the other horses. His mother told him it was fine with her if he wanted to be a horse and that she would bring his supper into the barn.
After a day of walking on all fours and running in the meadow, he was tired and hungry. He was anxious for his mother to bring him his supper. She came into the barn with a large bundle of hay for him. He was not happy about eating the hay even though it smelled very sweet. He could also smell what was cooking in the house where the people in his family ate, and he asked his mother what they were eating tonight. She answered, “Oh, we're having hot dogs, french fries and ice cream.’
What do you think he did?
Activity 2: Initiate a discussion about horses being horses and people being people. Ask why these differences are good. Have them list some of the good things about having different species in our world.
Activity 3: Have the children complete the sentence, “Different people and animals in the world are like...” The discussion as they create their sentence ending should move towards appreciation for the diversity of life on our planet.
Activity 4: Read the story together.
Activity 5: Work the with children on the following story details:
Why did Mother bat drop Stellaluna?
Who took care of Stellaluna when she got lost?
Why did Mother bird scold Stellaluna?
Name three differences between birds and bats. Encourage the children to find theanswers in the book.
Answers: An owl attached her.
A family of birds.
She was afraid her three babies would get hurt if they learned Stellaluna’s ways
They eat different things, they fly at different times, they sleep differently.
Activity 6: Have the children create a two-fold picture of Stellaluna flying like a bird, and flying like a bat.
Activity 7: Have the children write or discuss their reflections of the dialogue on the last page of the book concerning the mystery of being different and still being friends.
Activity 8: Have the children create a collage of their favorite color, food, game and a picture of themselves in their favorite clothes. Entitle the picture, “This is Me.” Post them around the room or in their homes in a prominent place. Entitle the display, “Our Differences.”
“Lovers of nature, superb artwork, and literature will not be disappointed reading this story to their little ones.” Reader testimonial.
